


the thing with feathers

by Clo



Category: Tennis RPF
Genre: M/M, Wingfic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-27
Updated: 2018-02-07
Packaged: 2019-03-10 07:43:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13497674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Clo/pseuds/Clo
Summary: No one expected Andy to grow wings. It was taken for granted that Novak would.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I have resurfaced from the pit of oblivion - or writer's block if you want to get technical about it - with...wingfic. I love wingfic (no arguments, wingfic is gloriously stupidly brilliant; fight me) and when I was mired in the trashfire that was my last six months of 2017, these were the only words that worked. 
> 
> Now it's 2018 and I'm dragging myself hand over hand back up on the writing wagon and posting this is a kick to get me going again - on everything. So updates to this will be between other things. Or when nothing else is working. 
> 
> Or when everything else is and I just want to write more anyway because you know the world needs more wingfic.

**the thing with feathers**

 

 **Miami,** **2006**

No one expected Andy to grow wings.

‘Better late than never,’ the tour doctor says jovially when Andy’s sitting shirtless on the examination table, poking at the new sore spots on Andy’s back with what seems like unnecessary carelessness for a health professional. ‘Not showing until late eighteen isn’t unheard of and your notes say your bones have taken their time filling out too; this must just be your growth pattern. Nothing to worry about.’

Hunched over on the table with the weight of the lumps on his back, there’s a lump in Andy’s throat too – one that has nothing physically to do with unexpectedly sprouting new bits of himself.

‘But tennis-’ he says and can’t finish, overcome by despair. He’s just starting to pick up the pace; he’d been going to make top twenty this year, almost certainly. Fledging is awkward and clumsy, two brand new limbs dragging balance all over the place until you learned how to handle it. Sometimes it takes _years_.

‘You’ll be fine,’ the doctor dismisses, sliding his backless chair away to type notes into Andy’s file on the computer, tucked into the corner of this tiny, airless room at the back of the tournament complex. His own wings are full-grown and as tall as he is, a muted pigeon-mottled grey folded high up his back to keep the tips from dragging on the floor. ‘Look at Rafael, see how he’s managed it. And there was an article in The Telegraph just this morning saying Roger wouldn’t be having the success he is without the wings. You’ll feel tired until they show feathers, it’s the growing taking it out of you, but the whole process speeds up once they start to show like this. Take it easy for a few weeks and you’ll be leaping off rooftops in a couple of months, or at least all over a tennis court.’

‘Can’t you-’

Andy hesitates, daunted by what he’s about to ask. There’s rumours and endless horror movies, that crushingly sentimental YA book on every bestseller list right now about the two teenagers with cancer who fall in love despite not being able to fly any more, but no one really _talks_ about it.

Still, if it helps his tennis-

‘Could I get them removed?’

The doctor’s hands go still on the keyboard. Almost imperceptibly his pigeon-coloured feathers fluff, a quiver of outrage in the ruffle of them and he swivels his chair to give Andy a look of such censure that Andy hunches further down between his aching shoulders.

‘That would be a conversation to have with your own doctor and, I would recommend, an army of specialists before any choices are made,’ the doctor says levelly. ‘However medical professionals are not in the business of mutilation, voluntary or not, so I would also recommend thinking very hard before making any rash decisions. Wings are a gift given to the lucky few, Mr Murray. Be very sure that regretting losing them for the rest of your life is worth a few years of tennis.’

 

*

 

The trouble was, no one knew for sure why some people grew wings and others didn’t. There’d been endless research and clinical trials in the last few decades, dubious autopsies during the nineteenth century exploring the scientific method of flight and everyone knew about Salem, seen the late-night Channel 4 documentaries with winged actors tied to stakes with the unconvincing CGI flames rising around them, but the end result was a whole lot of theories and little decisive evidence.

Genetically, wings could appear in any ethnicity, in children with flightless ancestors for generations, or two winged parents could not have a single winged child, although that was less common; it was apparently inexplicable to science and edging more rare than not. Only around a quarter of the world grew wings around puberty and even less added on the extra adaptations that allowed for flight, with lighter bones and the extended shoulder musculature. Kids grew up dreaming of flying, talking about what were the coolest wings to have and plastering their walls with photos of their favourite bird colorations.

But no one knew for sure until they turned nineteen. They either had them by then, or wouldn’t.

One of the more convincing hypotheses on how to predict though – to Andy at least – had always been body shape. Some people were born what the documentaries called ‘flight compatible’; slender and lighter in build, wiry muscles and a head for dizzying heights.

It was why no one blinked when a seventeen year old Roger walked into the Wimbledon locker room after three months off everyone’s radar, sporting a pair of glossy swept-up raptor wings in shades of brown and gold. He’d always been the awkward kind of skinny to suggest wings were inevitable, and the shape of his shoulders, broad over his ribs tapering to a neat waist, were textbook for flight. Andy’s read the countless interviews in which the Swiss talked about feeling incomplete without his wings, how the first day he’d stretched them out and leaped out into open air was the defining moment for him as a player, as a person, and wondered how much was truth and how much was bullshit for the journalists because he was annoyed at the endless questions.

Wings have always been envied fascination in any sport; Roger’s not the first to make number one in tennis with them, but he’s one of a precious few and the press can’t get enough of it.

Rafa had been more of a talking point because he’s built like a wall even now, heavy and solid and no one could picture him leaping off anything without plummeting like a rock.

But when his wings grew – typically, as with everything else Rafa did, early and amazingly fast – people started talking about the unusual strength he’d had for a fifteen year old. Some winged were like that, they said, the extra muscle mass layered in to support the extra limbs; it should’ve been obvious.

Not that Rafa can fly for shit – he’s not light enough for it, Andy only ever seeing him glide from court roofs, eagle-wings spread in a scruffy brown expanse because Rafa hates preening and endures the complaints about scattered feathers all over the locker room with good-natured indifference.

But after the fact, everyone acknowledged that they should’ve seen his wings coming. Certainly they didn’t slow him down on court, tucked in tight and the weight carried like it’s nothing.

In contrast, no one at all thought Andy would be winged. Sure he’d been skinny but without any outstanding features to suggest he could support two additional limbs; his shoulders were narrow, his back often aching as his bones grew in too slow, and his workouts were a never-ending slog to keep himself from cramping during matches. The winged often tended toward innate good fitness; cramping in mid-air meant ending up a feathered splat on the pavement, after all.

‘Only you could make winning the genetic lottery sound like a disaster,’ Jamie grumbles when Andy calls to tell him. He’s in Memphis for a 500 series event, tired and nursing a sprained ankle, while Andy’s melting on a bench in the sticky Miami heat waiting on his practice court to come free.

Andy almost hadn’t called to tell him because, of either of them, his brother was the one everyone thought might get lucky; he’s the right kind of slender and broad-shouldered, if a little tall. Jamie’d never acknowledged it but Andy suspects he’d been disappointed when nothing grew before he turned nineteen.

There’s a faint bitter edge now when his brother says; 'Of course it won’t stop you playing tennis. The next few months might suck but knowing you, you’ll just play through it.’

‘Sorry,’ Andy says. He feels obscurely guilty, for all that he didn’t ask his body to sign him up for this. For- for _wings_ , making himself think the actual word that he still shies from, uncomfortable. He’d been actively relieved when last Christmas came and he was almost too old, watching New Year slip past and thinking _that’s that then._

He’s not quite sure how to process this sudden new facet of himself, the mysterious ache between his shoulder blades that isn’t from over-practicing his serve after all. Never liked his body making decisions without his input – it feels like he’s already spent most of his life cursing it for refusing to cooperate, for staying fragile and capricious while Rafa steamrollered his way through the tour looking like he was already at his physical peak – but sprouting a new set of limbs is a whole new level of uncooperative.

Jamie snorts over the line. ‘Sure you are, whatever. It’s just something you’re born with dumbass; you didn’t do it on purpose. Have you told Mum yet?’

‘Yeah. She cried, it was awful. She wants to throw a Fledging Party when they show but it’s not like I can go gallivanting back to Scotland from the tour any time just because I’m turning into a chicken.’

‘You said it, not me,’ Jamie says and pauses.

Anticipating teasing chicken noises, Andy closes his eyes in resignation. The sun’s too bright anyway, the buttery-yellow slick of Miami that makes the air feel like wading through treacle, sweat already pooling at the dip of his back. He aches all over and the tournament hasn’t even started yet. Stupid fucking wings.

Instead of taking the piss, Jamie seems to guess how he’s feeling. His voice dips into the softly awkward tone they use only on each other, on the rare occasions when they’re trying to be nice but afraid of getting mocked for it; it always makes Judy roll her eyes at them affectionately.

‘Hey,’ he says in it, this time, ‘you know it’s going to be fine right?’

‘Is it?’ Andy asks and voices the fear that’s stalked him ever since the doctor said _congratulations, how do feel about flying?_ ‘What if I can’t play tennis any more when they come in? You know the stats on tour; barely ten percent of players have them and most of them scrape along in the two hundreds. They weigh a ton, and they’re always in the way – Monfils _tripped_ on his last week and had to retire because he yanked a feather or something. It’s a major handicap.’

‘I also know that two top top players in the world right now have them, and they’re doing pretty well for themselves,’ Jamie points out, running over Andy’s despairing protest. ‘And don’t say _stop comparing me to Rafa_ because you need to stop talking yourself down. They have wings, they play fucking amazing tennis, you’ll do the same yeah?’

Andy stares down at his trainers. They’re a standard tennis design, good grip and durability and he’s always liked them, but wings change weight distribution and balance, with extra cushioning needed at the heels. He’s going to have to ask Adidas to send him some options from their specialised line to try out, along with redesigning his entire kit for the season. He needs to look at nutrition supplements to make sure the fine wing bones grow in flexible rather than brittle. He has so much to do and he still has to _play tennis_.

‘I can hear you freaking out all the way in fucking Tennessee, you idiot,’ Jamie complains, obviously abandoning the softly-softly approach. ‘Will you start being excited about this instead of miserable, so I can get on with resenting my lucky little brother like in any normal family? Isn’t there anyone there yelling at you to get over yourself? What did Novak say?’

Andy knows that his intake of breath is sharp enough to give himself away, so he may as well be vocally honest.

‘I haven’t told him yet.’

Jamie's bewilderment echoes in the crackling silence over the line. ‘Why the hell not?’

With a shrug, Andy stands. Behind him the practice court is emptying, Cañas hefting up his tennis bag and joking with his winged coach as they stroll off; they both nod to Andy when they pass, the coach cautiously shifting his trailing crow-black pinions away from Andy’s feet. Staring after them Andy can’t help noting the lambent shades of green and purples in the feathers, the layers that catch the sunlight in a shifting rainbow as the man folds them closer to his back to keep them out of the way.

He’s built heavy; Andy wonders if he can fly, if he can step into space and have it catch him before he falls. If he resents having to maneuver two extra limbs around if he can’t.  
  
It's a pointless distraction; he doesn't need to fly to play tennis. Doesn't want to, anyway, not when Brad will be arriving any minute and Andy needs to be concentrating on getting though practice, especially when he hasn’t worked out how to tell his coach about how complicated his job is about to get. In truth — hasn’t had the heart to face the yelling, because they’ve barely worked together and he already knows that Brad doesn’t like anything not doing what it’s told, preferably before Brad’s even finished giving the order. That’ll almost certainly include Andy's biology throwing a spanner into tennis training, born with it or not.  
  
Novak- well, Novak is an entirely different problem on top of everything else. One that Andy has even less idea how to handle than his coach.

Although hey, if he tells Brad first maybe he’ll be too deaf from the yelling to hear Novak’s reaction.

‘I’ve not had time yet,’ he says gruffly, and, to cut Jamie off before he can launch an interrogation, ‘I’ve got to go, my court’s ready. Try not to trip over your doubles partner again in your next match yeah?’

 

*

 

Andy hasn’t told Novak yet because while no one expected Andy to grow wings, it was taken for granted that Novak would.

He had the shape for it, all slender, wiry strength and even the neatness of his hair, growing in flat and sleek, was one common indicator of someone who’d be growing feathers elsewhere in the future. Both his parents had them and most of his extended family, although Novak talked disparagingly about his cousin’s sparrow-striped flightless wings when only Andy could hear him. They used to lie on their backs in one or the other’s hotel rooms when they were juniors, shoulders brushing as Novak waved his hands to expound his theories of human flight.

‘Is not just the extras you get, you know?’ he’d said once when they were thirteen and in full-blown teenage awkwardness, crappy aircon in Andy’s cheap European hotel room circulating stale warmth over the bed. ‘Hollow bones are lighter but break easy, not so good for tennis and they are not so needed if you get the shape right, the wingspan. I should like a falcon, or perhaps eagle if not too heavy, something fast and I am not so big. And a good colour of course, though this matters not so much.’

‘Won’t they be black?’ Andy had asked, turning his head to look at Novak lying beside him, tan and patchy sunburn bright against the washed-thin hotel sheets. There’s the faintest suggestion of dark stubble coming in over his jaw, one more thing Novak is managing that Andy hasn’t, yet. ‘Your hair is.’

Novak waved an impatient hand, accidentally whacking Andy in the ribs.

‘No, is not the only factor! Have you not seen that player, he has been around juniors a bit, del Potro? Brown hair and just showing white wings, like snow.’ After a pause, he sniffed derisively. ‘Too flashy, you ask me. I bet he have no time to train with all the preening he must do. He turn ginger whenever he play clay.’

‘Yeah,’ Andy agreed. Partly to keep Novak happy and partly because he was picturing how ridiculous he’d look himself with snow-bright wings against his already pale skin and dirty reddish hair. Novak though-

‘I think you’d look good with white,’ he offered, flushing awkwardly. Meant it, though. Between the burnished-gold tan and the dark hair, white wings would make Novak a photographer’s fantasy, playing on the fallen angel cliché that made a comeback every few years. Every sponsor in the world would want to sign him for the advertising opportunities alone.

‘You’d be- striking,’ he added. Didn’t add _and_ _hot_ , because it’s not something he’d quite quantified to himself at that point, how to label the flicker of heat that shivered through him every time his shoulder brushed Novak’s, or the eagerness with which he looked for him in the locker room every day, the way it felt like his smile lit Andy up all over.

He didn’t think wings were worth hoping for whatever the colour, not when only a fraction off people got ones they could travel any distance with and they’re not exactly convenient for tennis, but Novak cared, and so Andy cared too.

‘You think?’ Novak asked, twisting to look at him.

His confidence was bright, smile broad but it was all flashy veneer. In the couple of years they’d been friends, Andy’d seen the cracks and the desperation to succeed beneath, the mirror of his own; it’s why they kept gravitating back toward each other, he thought, even after long months apart or making other friends on tour, among the distractions of wins and losses. As once-familiar kids failed out of juniors around them, lack of talent or money or the grinding ache of travel taking its toll, Andy knew Novak was in it for the long haul, knew Novak trusted him to keep being there just the same.

‘Yeah,’ Andy said, and grinned. ‘Also if you have to spend all that time preening, I’ll probably beat you more.’

That time degenerated instantly into a pillow fight, Novak winning because Andy lost his concentration when their legs tangled together and he had to pull back, let Novak push him off the bed before the shivery friction gave him a too-obvious problem. But other times he fell asleep to Novak’s mumble-tired voice from the other pillow, describing the properties of thermals, gliding and how not to stall in mid-air, aerodynamic theory coloured in Novak’s soft wonder. Caught Novak watching videos online of older winged players, glancing at his back in the mirrors in locker rooms, watching Rafa with wide, coveting eyes when he thought no one was watching.

Novak dreamed of flying as much as he dreamed of tennis, with a burning desperation he hid from everyone but Andy.

‘Is freedom to go anywhere,’ he’d confessed once, whispering in the dark when they both should’ve been asleep in their own rooms, Andy half-dreaming already, ‘to not be trapped in something terrible on the ground.’

‘Untethered,’ Andy had offered after a minute of thought, dredging the word up from the sticky weight of exhaustion and clarifying, at Novak’s soft query, ‘it means to not be tied down. To release something.’

In the darkness, Novak’s sigh was a warm breeze across his cheek.

‘You understand,’ he’d said, with the fragile edge of relief and Andy had mumbled something affirmative, glad his blush was hidden because he never wanted Novak to guess that he didn’t get it at all. Andy had enough to worry about with both feet on the ground; the idea of stepping off heights into unfettered space seemed to him like asking for trouble.

Watching Novak fly though – that was something he thought he might get used to. Something he could learn to love.

Until he didn’t have to.

Their sixteenth birthdays came and went without any sign of feathers, only Andy sulking around Scotland because he’d done his knee in, Novak’s postcards few and far between because he was working on turning pro while Andy languished behind, each one that did arrive a bright spot of sunshine amidst the British rain. Then it was seventeen, time slipping away like water around the stepping stones of regular tour events and soon whenever they met up everything was a whirl of Challengers and Futures, the constant ache of exhaustion from practice and if Andy noticed that Novak was looking strained around the eyes, he put it down to the step up in level from juniors to pro.

There was still time, still on track for all their plans to work out and when he’d texted Novak _‘Happy birthday! N e thing?’_ on his eighteenth, half-awake in a stuffy Spanish hotel room with sunshine spilling in through the open windows alongside the humming buzz of Barcelona, he hadn’t expected two days of silence in reply.

When his phone finally beeped, Novak’s answer was simply, ‘ _No._ ’

Reading it, something in Andy’s stomach had clenched uneasily. If they were wrong about this, when Novak had been so _sure_ _…_ what other plans might not work out?

Tennis? Them, everything Andy tried not to let himself think about and failed every time he caught Novak smiling at him across the locker room? The resigned misery of not having Novak within reach for months on end was already turning into the ache of everyday, countries apart and Novak falling quiet more often, drifting out of reach as if he was focusing all of his attention on tennis with none left over for Andy.

‘ _Could be this yr, plenty of time,’_ he’d texted back and tried not to be hurt when Novak didn’t answer.

It didn’t happen that year. Everything else did; Andy’s tennis caught fire after his birthday, shooting up the rankings as he channelled his misery into his game and when he bumped into Novak in the Wimbledon locker rooms, both of them past the second round and giddy with it, of _making_ it, Novak’s bare shoulders didn’t seem like such a big deal. The smile Novak tucked against his cheek when they hugged felt genuine, the smooth curve of his back perfect under Andy’s hands.

And it was about then that he’d started to wonder, with a quiet, pervasive doubt.

Wouldn’t it be better, if they were both wingless?

The press were already shouting about Andy being the next British hope and glory, more than a few murmurs about Novak as a rising star too and if they actually lived up to the hype and their own expectations, doing it without wings would be one more thing to tie them together. Novak growing wings would set him apart, elevate him up with Roger and Rafa as the untouchable gods of the game, dizzying heights beyond anything the rest of them could hope to reach.

And Andy, already struggling to keep up in Novak’s wake, would be left behind. Again.

He knew better than to mention it to Novak. But guiltily, right then, Andy found himself hoping they’d both end up without anything. Statistically, the odds on wings showing plummeted after turning eighteen, and he’d overheard in the locker room that Novak’s fourteen-year old brother, Marko, was showing signs already, so surely it was too late for Novak by now. Maybe this would turn into just another motivation, driving both of them; after the era of Roger and Rafa, of Serena over on the women's tour, Andy and Novak would prove tennis could be played without wings.

He’d never, in the whirl of tennis and training and worrying about Novak’s distance, considered getting them himself.

Not really – not even when, standing on the court in Bangkok last September, exhausted and trying to smile through disappointment as he held the runner up trophy to pose for the photos, Roger had put a hand on his back and leaned back to give him an unreadably odd look.

‘You okay Andy?’ he’d asked, palm resting directly over the ache that’d wrapped around Andy’s spine for weeks. Roger’s wings were half-mantled behind them as a backdrop because the photographers went nuts every time he showed them off, the sweet-smelling silk of the feathers brushing the back of Andy’s neck.

It felt nice, actually. Like he might lean back into the warmth and let it hold him up.

‘I’m fine,’ he’d dismissed with a shrug, resisting the urge to wince. His back always hurt; it was his bones growing they’d said, just something he’d have to deal with for a year or so. It barely slowed him down now. ‘Tired. Sorry I couldn’t beat you,’ he’d dared to add, with a grin to make it teasing.

Roger didn’t laugh but he grinned back, his hand drifting across Andy’s back as he moved away for his champion’s photos, feathers rustling softly.

‘You will,’ he’d said over his shoulder, just two words and Andy practically bounced off court, fizzing with excitement through his entire warm down and press and calling his mum to ask if she’d been watching, because Roger Federer _thought he was good_.

And he would’ve been. Might still be.

But no matter what him and Novak do now, if they get to one and two in the world and win every Slam for the next ten years, Andy will be doing it with wings.

And Novak won’t.

 

*

 

When the doctor said _tired_ , he clearly meant _fucking exhausted_. Andy drags himself through his practice under Brad’s glare, barely drags himself through a shower without falling asleep against the cubicle door, and drags himself and his tennis bags back to the hotel, intending to sleep for a million years – or at least until his match in the morning, which he hasn’t a hope of winning if he feels like this.

He’s stumbling out of the lift on his floor when he collides with someone lithe and solid. He almost drags both of them to the floor when he goes one way and his tennis bag goes the other, only hands catching his wrists keeping them all upright.

Andy looks up and the _thank you_ sours on his tongue because of course, of _course_ it’s Novak.

Novak who’s frowning at him, despite amusement curling around his mouth. There’s a patch of sunburn on his nose and he obviously hasn’t bothered to shave for a couple of days; he looks rumpled and familiar, and Andy’s heart still clenches in his chest like it does every time.

‘Andy,’ Novak says, still holding onto Andy’s wrists. His hands are warm, not gripping too tight but he must be able to feel Andy’s suddenly-racing pulse beneath his fingertips because a frown flutters over his face. ‘You okay? You look like Brad make you play a five set against Roger without breaks.’

‘I think he’d like to,’ Andy says. His back is aching fiercely and all he wants is to lie down; he doesn’t think he’s up to this conversation. ‘Uh, I think it’s just the heat getting to me. How’s things with you?’

Novak grimaces. ‘Same. I am tired of losing in first rounds you know? Thinking maybe it is time to be looking at new coaches.’

‘You can have mine,’ Andy offers, halfway sincere and Novak laughs, amusement spilling over to wipe away the worried lines of his frown.

‘If this is what you look like when he is done with you, no thanks.' He hesitates briefly. 'Maybe... we can practice soon though, if he will not glare too much? All these old players, they agree and show up but half the time they act like I am ballboy you know?’

There’s a tentative edge to the offer – possibly because it’s the first in months. Novak extending an olive branch after over a year of pulling away, everything Andy’s been waiting for-

And he’s hardly able to stand upright so there’s no way he’ll get through a whole practice without admitting the truth. Fuck, _fuck_.

What the hell; he'll drink a pint of coffee to stay awake and if he can’t bullshit through it, he’ll come clean. It'll be worth it to practice with Novak for the first time in months, just having him right here like taking a deep breath when he’s been suffocating under the weight of this, the unsettling decisions his body’s making without his consent.

And maybe having a planned time set aside, one on one with Novak on an empty tennis court, he’ll find the words somehow to explain, to apologise for something he couldn’t help.

'Practice sounds good,’ he says, aware he's paused a second too long and the relief that shadows over Novak’s expression gives him a twinge of guilt, chased hard by the realisation – he should just _tell_ him.

He pushes it fiercely down. It's not worth ruining this tentative thing between them because he’s been thrown an unwanted curveball by nature. Maybe if they're hanging out again before he confesses, Novak won't take the wings so badly.

That is, he can keep pretending that long when he's so _tired._

 _'_ I think I need to go crash now though, he admits, attempting an air of resignation. 'I’m supposed to play tennis tomorrow or something, and I think my knees might be going on strike. Why are we doing this to ourselves again?’

‘For the fame and the glory, and the many, many ouches are a bonus,’ Novak says. He seems to realise he’s still holding Andy’s wrists, incongruously, and lets them drop as he steps back. ‘I text you for the practice? If we both win tomorrow?’

‘After; don’t jinx it,’ Andy warns and summons up a grin. ‘Yeah. Looking forward to it.’

For a beat too long, Novak doesn’t move out of the way. He’s looking at Andy carefully, hazel eyes flicking over him all over and Andy’s stomach drops because, fuck, Novak knows more about wings than anyone Andy’s ever met, including most people who have them. There’s every chance he’ll look at Andy, openly exhausted and hunched slightly, and just _know_.

‘You sure you’re okay, Andy?’ Novak asks, softly. He’s frowning again, a sweet dimple sitting between his eyebrows. ‘If Brad works you too hard, is not good you know. If there is something wrong, forget the matches, you tell me yeah?’

Almost, Andy tells him. It’s on his tongue, the shape of the confession: _I’m growing wings_.

But Novak has a match to play tomorrow too, and it’s not a conversation to have in a hotel corridor when Andy’s too tired to keep his eyes open. Deliberately casual, he shrugs.

‘Of course. There’s nothing wrong, I’m just tired. Good luck for tomorrow.’

‘You too,’ Novak tells him. He steps aside but Andy feels the weight of being watched all the way back to his room, fumbling the key in his haste to get safely hidden behind the door where he can fall face-first onto the bed.

‘Fuck,’ he mumbles into his faceful of pillow. His back hurts so much, it feels like half the tour decided to break into his room and sit on it.

If they had, he has no doubt all of them would be saying, _Andy, you are such an_ _**idiot** _ _._

The echo of that thought running on repeat in his head follows him down to sleep and he dreams vague and disconnected, of clouds and lunging for a forehand on court to find nothing beneath his feet, of the swooping nausea of vertigo as he falls a long, long way.

 

He loses his match the next day, of course. It was a miracle he even makes it out on court after sleeping through two alarms, and waking so stiff that he can barely move his arms. The only reason he doesn’t get bagelled in straights is because Wawrinka seems so bemused by how badly he’s playing, he lets himself be distracted into stupid errors.

It’s still pretty humiliating all round. By the time Andy trudges into press after, he’s not sure if he wants to yell at the entire room or burst into tears.

Yelling looks set to win when the sharp-edged reporter from _The Independent,_ with her dove-cream wings folded small in the crowd and matching suit neat-as-a-pin despite the sticky heat, waves her dictaphone high to catch his attention and asks, dropping the bombshell for the very first question:

‘So Andy, do you think your recent performance struggles are anything to do with your wings growing in?’

Ignoring the rush of whispers that flood the room, certain he must’ve misheard, Andy stares at her.

‘I- I don’t- what?’

‘Your wings,’ she says, all professional calm that barely hides her glee at getting the scoop. ‘We have a copy of a report filed to the BIF last week that updates your fledging status to ‘imminent’. Given the physical toll this takes, do you think your recent results have been affected and are you planning on taking any time off to retrain once you show?’

Stunned to silence, gritting his teeth to keep from openly showing panic, Andy wonders if he can deny it or simply walk out. He’d known any doctor diagnosing a new _homo pennātus_ was obliged to register the change in status with the relevant local authority – in his case, the British Institute of Flight – but he hadn’t thought it’d be done _already._

He doesn’t even have feathers and wings are already ruining his tennis career. He didn't sign up for this, god _dammit_.

‘Those reports are confidential,’ is what comes out his mouth, with a numb edge and he only realises he’s accidentally confirmed her accusation when the whispers around the room crest to a peak, shouts and hands going up all the way to the back of the rows, a solid wall of sound bearing down on him. Desperately he looks around for the moderator to call order, maybe for the nearest door to bolt through because surely they’ve forfeited their right to an interview when they’ve stolen confidential medical reports-

Except, he can’t run – because the only accessible door is to his left, the one he came through from the locker rooms and the one all the players use when they want to duck in to check on each other’s press conferences –

– the one that, right now, has Novak standing in front of it.

He’s still sweaty and flushed in his match outfit, probably dropped in after to see why Andy played so terribly and, in this terrible moment when it feels like Andy’s drowning in a tidal wave of sound and panic, he’s staring at Andy with tearing, open hurt written across his face for all the world’s press to see

‘Novak,’ Andy says desperately.

The sound of it is lost and drowned in the din from the reporters but must be clear on his lips because Novak flinches like he’s been hit. His mouth trembles uncertainly down at the corners with the look Andy’s not seen since juniors, since Novak’s been learning to polish over his disappointment after losses as if everyone can’t see the cracks behind his careful smiles.

The look Andy _hates_ because half the time in juniors he was the one who put it there by winning their matches, but when he scrambles up to go over, mouthing ‘Novak, wait, _wait_ ’, Novak abruptly turns and slams out of the room. Before Andy can follow, the outcry from the reporters rises sharp enough to force him back into his seat; numbly he drops back, staring at the door swinging closed.

If he’d told Novak in the hotel- if he wasn’t such an _idiot_ -

He has no idea what he says for the rest of the conference. Only that it goes on for far too long and by the time the moderator calls off the questions for him to escape, trailing the shouts of reporters at his heels, there’s no sign of Novak anywhere.

 

*

 

Despite what he said to Jamie, he drags his aching back and misery home to Scotland. He’s got a wild card for Monte Carlo but it’s not for three weeks and the stack of leaflets the doctor handed him all warn against pushing himself too hard before his feathers show, so an impromptu training session somewhere sunny is out.

There was supposed to be Davis Cup against Serbia in April, in Glasgow no less and he’d been planning how to corner Novak all through his plane ride home, intricate plans involving enlisting patriotic Scottish fans and the rest of the team as misdirection so he could get Novak alone to just _talk –_ only to land to bleak Scottish rain and a blunt voicemail from Jeremy ordering him not to attend the tie.

‘ _We’ll manage Andy and honestly, you’re not going to be up to the press attention,’_ he’d said, Andy gripping his phone white-knuckled in the taxi home. _‘Late fledging can be complicated and none of us want you to push yourself too hard. Take some time off. We’ll talk again for the next tie when you’re back on your feet.’_

So, that was that. Everyone seemed to be making decisions for him; he’d talked over the _growing wings_ thing with Brad before leaving Miami – hadn’t had a choice really, after his face was on the sports pages of every newspaper with a rash of overexcited headlines declaring MURRAY TAKES FLIGHT DESPITE MIAMI LOSS and DON’T TALK ABOUT FLIGHT CLUB: MURRAY’S SECRET REVEALED – and got much the same orders. His coach had been surprisingly reserved in that he only yelled for five minutes before blowing out a breath, tugging at his greying hair and sighing.

‘I guess not even you could decide to grow wings from sheer stubbornness,’ he’d said. ‘Stop playing until you sprout the damn things and we’ll reassess then. I mean it, take the supplements, follow doctor’s orders, and stay in the fuck in bed. If you have to grow them at all, you may as well not be snapping the fucking things every time you trip over on court.’

Everyone seems to take it for granted that Andy will take being knocked on his ass by a few feathers with, if not good grace, then at least acceptance. He’s tired, sure – he’s sleeping twelve hours a night and having to force himself out of bed even then, a regular sleep pattern he hasn’t managed since he started playing tennis – and his back hurts with a constant bone-grinding ache that sometimes makes him go lightheaded if he gets up from the sofa too fast.

But he’s not a damn invalid. His Mum fusses, and his Gran talks about his Great-Uncle Archie who once migrated to Africa just to beat the English to the flight distance record, and Andy lies in his narrow childhood bed every night, staring at the football posters still tacked crookedly to the walls and feels the claustrophobia rubbing restlessly beneath his skin, the counter-melody to the throbbing points of pain in his spine.

The lumps are bigger every morning. He inspects them reluctantly in the bathroom mirror, craning his neck to see where the skin’s gone thin and trying to suppress the dizziness that flares when he pokes one, his shout of pain trapped behind gritted teeth. All the leaflets and the internet claim it’s entirely normal, reassure him he needs the sleep and the rest – and don’t mention anything about the way the stuffy indoor air feels like breathing sand, that he might need to take it slow but instead he’s gone from a hundred miles an hour to a complete halt and it’s driving him _crazy_.

‘Mum,’ he says after two weeks, perched on the edge of the sofa to watch TV because leaning back comfortably stopped being an option about a week and a half ago, ‘are you still going to Glasgow with Gran this weekend?’

Across the room, Judy lowers her book to pin him with a stare that suggests he should think carefully about whatever bullshit he’s about to pull.

‘No,’ she says evenly. ‘Because we were going for Davis Cup and you’re not playing. Are you?’

‘No, no, of course not! Just- do you think Gran would still like to go? She likes watching Novak play, she’s always said.’

One of Judy’s eyebrows lifts, a patented Murray household warning sign that she’s not convinced.

‘Yes she does, but Novak will play a lot more Davis Cups, some of them probably even in Scotland, and doctor’s orders are for you not to leave this house, let alone get pushed around in a crowd. Not happening.’

‘That’s not it!’ Andy says hastily. Carefully he lets his grimace show, noting the concern that chips away at her suspicion and thinking, _bingo_. ‘I’d stay here, it’s just...’

It’s not hard to let some of the strain slip out in his voice, the tired edge wearing down the bite of it. ‘I’ve been underfoot for two weeks and we don’t know how much longer this is going to take. While you’ve got the hotel booked anyway, do you think you could-’

‘Give you some peace and quiet away from my mithering?’ she finishes for him, mercifully. When he nods, to his immense relief her mouth quirks up. ‘Am I that bad?’

‘Only when I’m awake,’ Andy says straight-faced. She makes to throw a cushion at him before thinking better of it, putting her book aside and coming over to drop a kiss on his forehead.

‘Fine,’ she says, combing his hair straight (she still refuses to admit that it’s a lost cause). ‘We’ll give you some space. But three nights only, and we’ll just be over in Glasgow. If anything happens-’

‘Mu- _um_ ,’ he complains. ‘I’m not ten anymore and it’s three days, I’ll be fine.’ With a quiet flicker of guilt he adds, ‘I’ll probably sleep for most of it anyway.’

Two days later he waves them off from the front door on Thursday lunchtime, wrapped up in a pyjamas and looking suitably woebegone. After a judicious hour spent waiting – in case Judy ‘forgot’ something on purpose, because she might be sympathetic but him and Jamie learned, through years of failed escapades, that she’s hardly daft – he gets changed with an effort, jeans and hoodie because he can’t lift his arms into a t-shirt, and an hour after that he’s on the train rattling toward Glasgow.

He’s just going to track Novak down and apologise, he decides as he watches the grey spring day roll past the windows, Scotland resisting the advancing summer with its usual obstinacy. His back is burning like someone put a lit match to it but he's outside and the pressure on his chest's lifted slightly, the promise of Novak within reach.

Say sorry, and go home again. Simple as that.


	2. fledging

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Andy manages to make a simple thing much more complicated than anticipated. No one is surprised, including Andy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was waiting 'til Friday to post this as a weekend surprise but this week has been truly, monumentally terrible and I need to feel like I've accomplished something. Have a chapter.

* * *

 

 

'Go away,' Novak snaps the instant he opens the door far enough to see Andy. He starts to shut it again, fast enough to slam but Andy steps into catch it against his shoulder and oh _fuck_ that hurt.

'Novak wait,' he says around a gasp. There's lights glittering at the edges of his vision from the jolt of pain, all his bones feeling reshuffled and grouchy but he takes a few deep breaths until he's sure he won't pass out. Almost sure. 'I just want to apologise, please.'

Novak makes a scornful noise from the other side of the door. 'For what? Why are you even here, they say you are not playing? Are you sent as a distraction?! Go home and leave me to play tennis.'

'Not- not until we talk about this.' Letting the door take his weight, Andy shuts his eyes against the ache of his back, pain threatening to make his voice wobble. 'I'm sorry okay? I didn't know how to tell you, and the fucking press sprung it before I worked out what to say.'

There's silence from Novak's side of the door for so long, Andy's heart sinks. Then-

'I don't see what is so hard,' Novak says and he’s sunk into genuine hurt, quiet with the weight of it, 'in saying "Novak I am getting wings."'

'I know, I know- I'm sorry. I was being an idiot about it happening at all, and I didn't want you to be mad at me, and then this press shit all came out of nowhere.' Andy's voice does wobble then, tripping over the crushing weight of panic that he's been suppressing for what feels like centuries. 'It's been a really long month, okay?'

This time the silence drags out for almost a minute. Andy stares at the cheap hotel carpet which is an offensive shade of purple, at the other room numbers where he hopes the Serbian Davis Cup team aren’t watching this disaster through the peepholes, and wonders if this is it. For the rest of their careers, if this is the moment that their friendship sinks and rivalry surfaces, like Jamie and the older players and the entire world’s press keep hinting is inevitable.

Then the door swings open, fast enough that Andy has to catch his balance against the frame with another jolt. Novak’s standing there in sweatpants and the faded _Pilic Academy_ tee he still sleeps in, barefoot and hair flattened on one side, sleep-rumpled, and wearing a disgruntled expression as he glares at Andy.

Andy’s heart does a skip and a flutter at the sight of him nevertheless, and he curses himself silently for being a hopeless lost cause.

When Novak demands, ‘A month? What do you mean?’ it takes an effort to reset his brain from delight over the sight of Novak to actually processing. Even then, all he manages is,

‘What?’

The suspicion in Novak’s frown edges into bewilderment, something uncertain quivering around the tight curl of his mouth. ‘You say a month! How long have you known this, that you grow wings?’

‘Oh.’ Grimacing inwardly, Andy takes a deep breath and recites the progression of symptoms he’s had to run over with the tour doctor, his mother, his own doctor, Brad, and about a million members of the international press who’ve clearly been wasting their words in Novak’s case if he genuinely doesn’t know.

‘It’s been two weeks here now, and a week in Miami,’ he says, counting on his thumb and two fingers, ‘I found out the week before but I knew something was up for a few days before that when I noticed my back had two ruddy giant mountains on it and I couldn’t move to serve right, so... I guess a month is about right? You found out like a week in and I was still freaking out, I’m sorry, I was trying to work out-’

Novak cuts him off with a sigh that implies he’s on the verge of rolling his eyes, for all that he’s still pulled in tense around his hurt. ‘No, no, not what I mean. How could you only know so short only? Your back must hurt for _months_ , Andy!’

‘Uh, yeah.’ Andy shrugs and instantly regrets it, swallowing the gulp of breath at the protest from his shoulders. It’s getting worse since he’s been standing here, creeping up the length of his spine to sit as the beginnings of a jarring headache at the back of his skull but there’s a softening to Novak’s glare that says he’s getting somewhere; he can’t tap out yet. Tightening his grip on the doorframe to keep himself upright, he forces a deprecating smile.

‘I uh, thought it was just my usual stupid back issues, he admits. ‘You know, me growing slower than the rest of you because I didn’t get enough sunlight as a kid in Scotland, whatever. It’s been the same _just wait it out_ advice forever so I only went to the doctor when the lumps started.’

‘But-’ Novak’s glare is fading away as he stares at Andy, mouth open on something wordless and disconcerted and Andy frowns.

'Novak, what?' he asks.

Novak blinks. 'That is not- I hear them all joke in the locker room, last year,’ he says, slow, clarifies at Andy’s frown. ‘The other players – they talk about wings and who get them next, take bets, and Roger say _you_ with that _god of tennis_ tone he get, where he is certain of being proved right and at the time I think he is only being ridiculous but then it come out that you do and I think-’

He cuts off, his mouth twisting down unhappily but not before Andy’s got the point and _ah_....crap.

He’d taken Novak’s reaction as something he’d earned, justified entirely, because he had the opportunity to come clean and chose to lie. But if Novak thought he’d been doing that for much longer instead of days, sat on this monumental thing for _months_ when he knew it was everything Novak wanted –

But mostly, if Novak thought he'd told _Roger_ ... Roger who treats Novak with polite dislike that the Serb pretends doesn’t hurt, ignoring it with a facade of blithe dismissal – only Andy knows Novak and all the ways his showing off is a cover for his desperate need for approval, to be _liked._

Roger’s as good as it gets in tennis right now and he’s always been friendly to Andy – helpful, offering occasional encouragement in the locker room. Laughing with him on court in Thailand, talking about Andy being the next big thing in British tennis. Something else that Andy’s had that Novak hasn’t.

And Andy hadn’t even thought, fumbling through this as if he doesn’t know Novak at _all_.

‘Hey,’ he says, tongue gone clumsy with dismay. ‘If Roger knew anything, he definitely didn’t tell me. Bastard,’ he adds, deliberately and catches the twitch of Novak’s involuntary smile. ‘I would’ve told you if I’d known any longer, I promise. You know me, I can’t lie for shit anyway.’

He adds the last with a flicker of amusement, aiming for teasing – and naturally, as if the karmic gods heard him and decided to give him a kicking good and proper, it’s wiped away in an instant at another cramp of pain from his back. This time he can’t swallow the gasp, knuckles going white on the door-frame to keep himself from doubling over as it feels like his entire body knots up in searing protest.

 _Breathe_ , he reminds himself as he shakes, strained with panic, breathe and apologise to Novak and walk away, find somewhere to sit down before he falls.

He didn’t think it’d be this bad. Expected the grinding tiredness but this is worse than any pain he’s suffered through in the name of tennis, worse than his knees or the tooth abscess he’d had when he was ten. This hurts too much to _think_.

Hands on his shoulders come as a shock, invasive – but they’re gentle, sliding over the tense muscles down to his shoulder blades. Andy doesn’t have the air to croak a warning but Novak barely brushes the throbbing lumps beneath his hoodie before jerking away, cursing long and sharp in Serbian.

‘Andy?!’ he demands over the ringing in Andy’s ears, ‘you have not fledged yet, what are you doing walking around? Do you have a room?’

‘Came on train,’ Andy gasps. Fuck, it feels like his spine’s being pulled apart and rearranged. ‘Wanted- to apologise. Sorry, sorry, I’ll go-’

‘Yes, of course, I am to let you walk perhaps many miles back to your train and wait and get home, I will simply wave you goodbye and in twenty minutes when the hotel call me to say someone has fallen on their face in the lobby, I will come downstairs to pick up your pieces and many times say _I told you so_.’

Novak’s tone is irritated, sharp over the echoing buzz of dizziness in Andy’s head, but his hands are light and careful on Andy’s shoulders as he braces him up, voice edging down to almost kind as he asks, ‘Did you not read anything? Did your doctor not tell you not to be walking around?’

‘I figured everyone was exaggerating,’ Andy confesses. He dips his head to gasp quietly, leaning into Novak’s hands as what feels like every muscle in his back cramps around each vertebrae. ‘N- now I’m thinking maybe not, maybe they should’ve underlined some points- ow, fuck _ow_.’

Novak’s sigh gusts against his cheek but he moves to slide an arm around Andy’s waist, absurdly careful as if Andy might bruise if he touches too hard.

‘One day, this way you have of not admitting when you cannot do something will actually end in terrible things for you,’ he says, bitterness there and gone like a passing cloud. ‘Come on, you must lie down, it is amazing you make it here at all. How did you know where in hotel I was?’

‘Greg,’ Andy admits. Walking takes most of his concentration as they limp into Novak’s bland hotel room, with the warmth of Novak’s hand at his hip claiming the rest; the words trip out on autopilot around his muted sound of pain when he stumbles. ‘I told him I wanted to send a present to your room to say sorry I couldn’t play and he didn’t question it.’

Novak mutters something under his breath. ‘Did not question that the present perhaps was you. And of course Rusedski knew, because he gossip better than he win matches. Why did you let him in your country again?’

‘Because we’re shit at tennis and we were desperate,’ Andy says, not censoring the overtone of _duh_ , hurting too much all over to bother with niceties like tact. When his knees bump the edge of the mattress, he lets Novak ease him down and crawls the rest of the way over the tangled quilt, the smooth thickness of hotel cotton, sinking limply into the pillows with a sound of relief choked off as all his limbs relax. The burn of his back subsides to a sulky throb, still vicious and insistent but at least he’s not teetering on the edge of passing out.

The mattress dips as Novak sits beside him. On his bed, that Andy’s sprawled across and he makes a small, guilty sound.

‘Sorry,’ he says, feeling his cheeks heat with a flush. ‘I didn’t mean to- give me a minute, I’ll go.’

‘Of course. Shall I help you to the elevator or will you be okay crawling?’

Embarrassed and tired, finally admitting to himself that this trip might’ve been glaringly stupid, Andy’s still mortified to feel the hot burn of tears behind his eyes at the bite in Novak’s voice. He hates it, hates knowing that once he lets himself break he’ll not stop and turning his face into the pillow – it smells like Novak’s aftershave and body-warm cotton, like his teenage years distilled – he swallows, holding very still as if he can keep himself together if he just doesn’t breathe.

Novak’s hand on his shoulder ruins the effort. He flinches from it, nerve-wrenching flare of pain from his back and that, with Novak’s soft-murmured apology, is the tipping point. Burying his hitched breaths in the pillow, Andy feels the cotton grow damp beneath his face as all his misery spills over.

He’s not surprised when Novak’s hand disappears – it’s terrible of him to be this selfish, sobbing because he has everything Novak wanted – but then the bed dips again, on the other side and there’s an arm going around his waist, familiar but unexpected, skinny knees knocking his and Novak whispering comfort into the tangled thatch of his hair, warm and apologetic, bracketed close around him on the lumpy mattress.

‘I’m sorry,’ Andy manages, choked. ‘I know you wanted- if I could give you-’

‘I know, I know this.’ Novak’s hand is a soothing warmth at the small of his back, the words murmured into the dip of Andy’s temple. ‘I am sorry also, I was not thinking how much you hate surprises, I should not have been angry. It hurt now but it will all be fine, Andy.’

The sound that Andy chokes out, supposed to be a laugh and falling short, twists into despair. ‘How do you _know_?’

He doesn’t need to see Novak’s smile to feel it, curving through his voice and into the tension wrapping Andy in knots, easing down the cramped hunch of his shoulders involuntarily with a thread of something cool, calm to anchor him through the ache in his bones,

‘Because,’ Novak whispers, ‘now I get to watch you fly. And that is almost like it will be flying myself you know?’

 

*

 

Fledging, even with Novak right there to hang on to, is spectacularly awful.

Andy drifts in and out of fractured sleep, chased by low-grade fever dreams. The insistent throb of his back keeps tripping him into wakefulness, only to sink back down into the exhaustion like quicksand and he loses any grip on time passing, only the passing shadows of brightness behind his eyelids that might be daylight or the curtains being shut, the soft murmur of a voice across the room – Novak’s, the realisation he’s still there curling comfort into a knot of warmth beneath Andy’s misery.

Even though he shouldn’t be there because he has _tennis_ to play, Andy’s dreams stalked by vague worry that the Serbian team will find him in Novak’s room and all hell will break loose.

But every time he’s forced awake there’s only Novak, bracing him up with steady, careful touch to offer Andy a sip of water, sitting beside him with glasses slipping down his nose and a book resting on one drawn-up knee, burnished soft by the lamplight and almost always in reach when Andy wakes or there again if Andy makes a pained sound, hands tangling as Andy grits his teeth and endures.

‘You don’t have to stay,’ Andy says, one time when the ache eases enough for him to form the thought and guilt overwhelms the desperate inner voice, asking how he thinks he’ll get through this alone. He’ll manage, he always does. ‘If you get another room I’ll pay you back – you need to go play the tie, they must be asking-’

‘I do not need to go anywhere.’ Novak’s leaning back against the pillows beside him, half-shadowed in the lamplight, flicking through a Lonely Planet guide to Monte-Carlo and twirling a biro idly between his fingers. Every so often, he’ll pause to write something (probably scathing) in the margins. ‘It is fine Andy, I can be here. Unless-’

The biro skitters over his book, Andy watching it slide a haphazard line from where he’s curled around a pillow at Novak’s side, the way it digs a hole through the paper with Novak's sudden uncertainty as he says, ‘Unless you would like me to call someone else? Your mother?’

Andy’s flare of panic sets off his back again, muscles fluttering as he pushes up on one elbow but he grits out the protest; ‘ _No._ She doesn’t know I’m here, don’t-’

‘Okay!’ Dropping the pen, alarm shaped in the arch of his eyebrows at _she doesn’t know_ , Novak reaches out to catch Andy’s shoulder and press him down again. ‘Okay, I will not call, no Judy, no telling, only you are to not try to go wandering understand?’

‘Fine. No more secret trips to the pool when you’re in the bathroom,’ Andy agrees, no real effort behind the joke, allowing himself to be eased breathlessly back to the mattress. Just that tiny movement set every nerve on fire, his body pointing out the error of trying to move anywhere other than this bed, nested in the supportive heap of pillows Novak arranged the first time Andy rolled onto his back in his sleep and yelled loud enough to be heard in Edinburgh.

He can’t suppress a sigh as he resettles himself. It’s easier to breathe without supporting the weight on his back but he’s still heavy with exhaustion, and he watches Novak retrieve the pen through eyes half-lidded, the flash of teeth biting his lip as he reads another page. He looks tired, too; it’s sitting in the circles under his eyes, in the frown that says he’s having to work to focus.

‘You don’t have to do this you know,’ Andy says, letting it hang quiet like a confession between them. ‘You can call my mum if you want, I don’t mind.’

Novak’s pen moves decisively over the page, looping his neat, rounded script around the print. ‘It is fine, Andy.’

‘It’s not really, though. I might have feather brain but I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to be playing tennis right now-’

‘ _Andy_ ,’ Novak says and gives him a look, affectionate beneath the attempt at exasperation, softness breaking through the curl of his mouth. ‘You would do it for me, right?’

Andy blinks. ‘I- yes. Of course I would.’

‘Okay.’ Novak looks back at the book and circles something. After a moment’s consideration, he adds an exclamation mark beside it. Even through a couple of days of dark stubble, it’s obvious that the corners of his mouth are losing the fight against a smile. ‘So please would you shut up and go to sleep already?’

The sarcastic comeback that Andy knows would be dry and witty and win him the argument for sure, is lost when he does just that.

Sleep feels like a fog he wades through, like a Scottish winter snowstorm that’s half-sleet and bitter ice, all grey, and the cold seems to lace his bones until he can’t move, trying to follow voices that are always just out of reach. The ache presses him down, suffocating, and he dips in and out of hazed impressions, losing time; Novak offering him painkillers, his reassuring whisper that they’re tour-approved; the glow of the TV, muted; water, lukewarm in his mouth as he sips; Novak catching him as he jolts upright-

Upright with a scream lodged between his teeth, the spark of pain in his back suddenly lighting up into a furnace, clawing bruises into Novak’s wrists with the force of his grip.

‘Ow fuck ow fuck _fuck_ _fuck_ -’

He runs out of voice fast, blinking over blurred vision to glimpse an after-impression of Novak’s wide eyes, the panic he hastily schools down to blankness. Andy makes a rasped plea in his throat, not even shaped like words and bows forward to press his face into the dip of Novak’s shoulder before he can do something completely humiliating, like burst into tears from the pain. Again _._

Only when Novak touches him, hesitant brush of fingertips to the back of his neck, does he realise he’s shaking.

'Andy?' Novak asks. For all his attempt to keep a calm front, his voice quivers; he sounds young, Andy thinks hazily, hearing the echo of an eleven year old he'd just beaten in straight sets, the unhappy way his shoulders hunched at the net when he asked, _'Your name is Andy?'_

Then another wave of hurt reorients him in the now and Andy groans, clutching at Novak's decidedly-not-eleven-year-old arms, feeling distantly guilty because he knows he’s digging in his nails and it has to sting, but Novak doesn’t move.

'This hurts like a motherfu- _ah_ .’ Andy starts, cutting off to hiss as it feels like his goddamn _bones_ cramp. ‘Is- is this supposed to-’

‘Yeah. I think- not so much if it happen when you are younger but this late, when they have grown so much-’ Novak frees one arm to slide a hand down the curve of Andy’s spine between the points of burning heat, palm like sandpaper over the hot, bare skin because Andy lost his hoodie a while back, is fuzzy on when. He jerks away quick when Andy makes a strangled sound. ‘This- this is normal. I think.’

‘You _think_ -’

‘I haven’t _done_ it, you are the one who cannot listen to their doctor-!’

‘He said it’d be fine; this does not feel fi- ah, _ow_.’ Andy muffles a howl like he’s dying into Novak’s shoulder, grip clenching involuntarily on Novak’s hands again. ‘Can’t you do- something?’

‘Like _what_?’

If it hurts anymore, Andy’s not sure he’ll be able to keep breathing. ‘Right now?’ he manages, teeth gritted, ‘Knocking me out and waking me up when this fucking nonsense is over sounds pretty- _ow –_ good.’

Novak makes a distressed noise. ‘No Andy, head injuries are a terrible plan. You are not allowed to make plans anymore, nobody is knocking anyone out-’

‘Then _do something_ ,’ Andy hisses, dimly aware that he’s being unreasonable and hurting too much to care. Novak’s shoulder is right there against his teeth, cotton of his t-shirt soft over the unyielding muscle beneath and it’s snarl or bite down to make himself feel better, briefly, something to do with his teeth other than grind them together.

Desperately he focuses on how Novak smells as a distraction, the familiar warmth of him and the faint laundry-sharp edge to his shirt, the sleepy edge of salt-sweat and the tang of biro ink. Novak who’s trying to help, he reminds himself, who doesn’t deserve to have to explain teethmarks to his physio for the next week.

‘I- okay, I think I have something. I need to move though, Andy-’ Novak’s attempts to extricate his hands makes Andy realises how tight he’s hanging on, white-knuckled around Novak’s fingers and he swears low and desperate as he forces himself to let go.

‘Sorry, sorry-’

Novak pats his shoulder reassuringly. ‘Is fine, okay? I will be a minute,’ and he eases Andy down to the mattress, hands only trembling a little. ‘Stay here.’

‘Not exactly planning a round the world trip,’ Andy says through gritted teeth as he curls around a pillow. Already he misses Novak’s solid warmth, squashing the kneejerk urge to reach after him as he slides off the bed; instead he focuses on his breathing, trying to regulate it lower than a humiliating urge to pant. It doesn’t occur to him to wonder what Novak’s not-involving-bodily-harm grand idea might be until there’s a hand on his hip, at the waistband of his sweatpants and Andy’s thought process shorts out for a second because he _can’t_ mean-

‘Hey,’ Novak says somewhere above him, ‘I must take your pants off,’ and Andy wonders in a daze if he’s hallucinating from pain, if Novak actually knocked him out after all and this is a concussion fantasy.

‘What the fuck?’ he demands, half-muffled by a mouthful of pillowcase.

Novak tugs at the pants, the press of his fingertips hot and damp over Andy’s hipbone as the fabric slides down. ‘If you wish me to help then you must believe me. Come on, or do you feel better enough already?’

‘I feel like maybe I’m going crazy,’ Andy says, bewildered, and catches his breath as Novak _actually_ yanks his sweatpants down. Leaves his boxers on, but his hands are warm and brisk as he frees Andy’s legs from the tangle, sparks a rush of sensation when he brushes against the ticklish spot behind Andy’s knee and Andy catches half-a-dozen protests behind his teeth, still aching but there’s a heat flickering as he tries to will himself not to be interested.

Difficult, because he _is_ – always is, Novak the undersong of his entire life since he was eleven – but it’d be a terrible idea to let himself have this when Novak thinks it’s nothing more than- than fucking _pain relief_. Not fair to either of them and he opens his mouth to protest.

‘Up,’ Novak orders before he can say anything, his hand closing firm around Andy’s wrist and pulling inexplicably. Andy’s already lying down so what does- ‘Into the bathroom.’

Too confused, too tired and hurting too much with a burning bone-deep ache to argue, Andy lets himself be towed upright and helped off the bed, bracing himself against Novak’s steady grip. His legs feel like they’ve been replaced with matchsticks, muscles shifted subtly out of alignment and he swallows choked sounds on each step as they stagger like a comedy act towards the room’s ensuite, avoiding stray shoes and books and Novak’s tennis bag more by luck than intent, Andy blinking back dizziness. The only light is the bedside lamps, pooling yellow across the pillow-heaped bed and everything, the mass-produced furniture and forgettable artwork, the TV showing a tennis court with the sound muted, is softened to half-focus.

Andy doesn’t have time to pick out the names against the score on the screen to work out how many matches of the tie Novak’s missed, a bare second to register his guilt anyway, before they stumble into the tiny bathroom and Novak grins, gesturing his hand through the steamy air to indicate his plan.

‘Here we are – what is it that you say? Ta-da!’

Andy stares. ‘You- you ran a bath?’

‘It help the muscle ache,’ Novak explains patiently, as if Andy hasn’t spent the last decade playing sport competitively for fuck’s sake. ‘The warmth, the bath salt. You get in, feel better.’

‘And when I fall asleep and drown?’ Andy asks.

A brief, genuine look of dismay crosses Novak’s face. 

'This I had not thought of,’ he admits.

Andy looks back at the steaming water and sighs. It does look inviting, and for all that bits of his anatomy are disappointed they won’t be getting sex after all, the rest of him is nagging quite insistently that he sink into the bath and take his chances with the drowning; he’s going lightheaded again from standing, his knees trembling in a way that suggests falling on his face is imminent.

Half-drowning himself when he dozes off every five minutes doesn’t particularly appeal though.

‘It was a good idea-’ he starts, already turning back toward the bed and then Novak makes an impatient sound, shifting Andy’s hand from his waist to the wall to brace himself and stepping back.

‘Hah, you should know this by now, that I can solve all things,’ he says with a triumphant air and whatever retort Andy could make to that gets swallowed as Novak yanks his t-shirt over his head.

‘What- what are you-’

‘You cannot be left unsupervised, so we get in bath and you feel better and I do not have to explain to your mother why Jamie now must be her favourite child if I let you drown,’ Novak says, with an air of such reasonableness that it almost lulls Andy into agreement – until Novak starts sliding down his own sweatpants and his body forcefully reminds him why cuddling up to a wet, mostly-naked Novak is a _terrible idea_ if they ever want to look each other in the eye ever again.

‘Don’t you think that it’s a bit- weird?’ he asks desperately.

Down to boxers now, Novak rolls his eyes. ‘Andy, last week the drug tester, he wake me very early and we have to wait for-’ He makes a gesture that indicates a morning erection approximately the size of the Eiffel Tower and Andy flushes, ‘- to go away before he watch me pee. If I can do that with total stranger, I can share bath with my best friend yes?’

‘I- I guess-’

‘Good,’ Novak says firmly and holds out his hand. Dazed, Andy lets go of the wall to take it and wobbles, vision going sparkly at the edges as his body protests all the upright motion; blindly, he reaches and feels Novak catch him, fingers twining steady with Andy’s to keep him upright.

The dizziness stays though, as he feels Novak help him over the bath side. Warm hands on too-much bare skin make him shiver, overwhelmed by the temperature contrast as he slides into on-the-edge-of-too-hot water that has a soft, familiar scent rising with the steam. It eases the nerve-wrenched ache of his back the instant his shoulders slide under.

‘Better?’ Novak says, made rhetorical as Andy can’t swallow a gasp of relief. He’s arranged them lying down in the tiny space that Andy’s learned cheap hotels consider adequate bath sizing, Andy on his side with his shoulder resting against Novak’s chest, his legs tucked up beneath the taps and Novak’s knees bracing him on either side.

It’s a lot of bare skin on skin, overly-intimate even for them; it _should_ be weird.

Except – the water is seeping all the tension out of Andy’s back, muscles unknotting for what feels like the first time in days and he can rest his head above the waterline against the convenient dip of Novak’s shoulder, all wet, soft skin, the faint gilt of it because Novak’s always tanned where Andy burns. Any awkwardness fades under the sheer weight of relief that he can take a deep breath comfortably for the first time in months.

‘This was a genius plan, yes?’ Novak asks, only sounding slightly smug. Relaxed, finally, Andy makes an involuntary sound of contentment that he’d deny under questioning.

‘It was pretty good,’ he admits. ‘But now I’m wondering something.’

Tangled together like this, he can feel the stutter of Novak’s breathing. ‘What?’

Andy shifts a little and closes his eyes, listening to the soft lap of water. ‘Why do your bath salts smell like flowers?’

Any leftover tension vanishes when Novak squawks indignantly and splashes him. ‘What do you try to say, my bath things are not manly enough for you?!’

‘Not at all. It’s great actually; now when I buy my mum Body Shop sets for Christmas, I can buy one for you at the same time,’ Andy says, deadpan and gets splashed again with a faceful of lavender-smelling water, still spluttering when Novak pokes him reprovingly in the chest.

‘No gratitude,’ he grumbles. ‘I should have let you wander into the city, let many of your journalists to take embarrassing photos of you falling over. You do not deserve my bath salts.’

After a pause, he pokes Andy in the chest again with a wet fingertip, ignoring Andy’s muttered protest. ‘Hey, did you notice this?’

‘My ribs yeah, I’m pretty fond of them.’

‘Do you ever even look in mirrors?’ Novak asks, sharp with exasperation. ‘ _This_ , Andy,’ and he pokes Andy again right in the sternum which, now Andy’s paying attention, hurts more than it should.

‘ _Ow_ ,’ he offers as a token protest before he looks down. At the red mark Novak’s left which might bruise and he thinks about complaining some more, abuse of an invalid and all that, only now he’s actually looking there is something- off about the shape of his chest beneath the faintly cloudy water. The curve of it gone convex where it should be concave in the middle, the ridge barely perceptible which is probably why he hasn’t noticed it before but definitely _wrong_ and he makes a strangled sound, feeling the panic start to flutter like something alive beneath his skin.

Novak catches his wrist as he reaches up to rub frantically at his own chest, gone suddenly unfamiliar beneath his palm.

‘Whoa, Andy, this is okay!’ His hand is slippery and hot, steady where Andy’s shaking. ‘This is a good thing!’

‘Wings are supposed to grow on my _back-_ ’

‘And they do,’ Novak says, the eye roll he’s probably making obvious in his exasperated tone. ‘I am starting to think the doctor should use small words when he speak to you. This is change to go with them, a good one. Your chest change shape, give more weight to help you in air, see?’ He guides Andy’s hand to his own sternum by his wrist, tracing the new curve, ripples on the cloudy water blurring their fingers together; the brush of his palm over the sensitive skin makes Andy shiver. ‘It will not look much but it provide- like a ship you know, the bit beneath to keep you right way up? And more space to breathe. Is good, is a sign you fly. Maybe for a long way,’ he adds after a pause.

There’s the faintest edge of longing to that last, in the way the sound snags in Novak’s throat like fine silk over a rough surface. Andy’s panic blends into guilt, _sorry_ catching in his own throat because it’s beginning to sound hollow with repetition.

‘I just want to play tennis,’ he says instead. It comes out frustrated and soft, an echo of misery back from the tiled walls.

Novak sighs. ‘This will not stop you doing that, Andy.’

‘My chest _changing shape_ oh no, that won’t affect my serve at all,’ Andy says, thick with sarcasm and feels it hit home in Novak’s flinch, the way he lets go of Andy’s wrist too-sharp as if it’s that or clench his grip to bruise.

Before he can apologise – but not before he feels guilty, wishing he’d learn to keep his tongue reined in when it counts – Novak growls something irritated in any one of the handful of languages he likes to insult Andy in, because he can’t take offense if he’s squinting in confusion.

‘If you pay any attention to anything,’ he snaps, ‘you will know that if anything it will _help_.’

There’s a frustrated thread to it, verging on bitter and, ignoring warnings from his back, common sense, and Novak’s alarmed hiss, Andy splashes painfully into sitting up. If this is going to to turn into an argument, he doesn’t want to do it doing- well, whatever they were just doing he amends, because he refuses to think the word _snuggling._ The cooler air sits unhappily on his wet shoulders, but at least he can give Novak the best unimpressed look that he learned from his mother.

‘If you’re about to give me some bullshit about how Rafa manages just fine, save it. I’ve already heard it all.’

Novak lifts an eyebrow. He’s leaning back against the end of the bath, head tipped against the hotel-white tiles and his bare, slender shoulders gleaming wet and gold in the overhead spotlights, as relaxed to be wet and almost-naked here as he always is in locker rooms, stepping unselfconsciously out of the showers while Andy clings to his towel. The only mar to the photographer’s wet dream – and no doubt Andy’s for the next decade, now he’s seen this – is a faint pink mark on his collarbone where Andy’s forehead rested.

‘Who say Rafa?’ Novak asks. ‘Rafa has only the giant wings, no extras to balance giant weight of his giant tennis-ball-killing arms - which is why he cannot fly for shit. Roger on the other hand...’

His mouth pulls in tight, probably intended to shape the standard exasperation of the locker room for Roger and his ridiculous tennis superpowers but Andy knows him, knows how unhappiness sits on his face and it’s there, written in the lines of his frown as he reaches over to gently flick Andy’s chest, ‘Roger have this too. Is why he can do the fancy acrobatic flying, you know like the showing off he do for BBC, chasing those pigeons at Wimbledon last year? But is also extra strength, extra muscle. Is how he hit all those ridiculous forehands.’

‘I don’t play like Roger,’ Andy says inanely, the instinctive refusal tripping out. Novak’s other eyebrow lifts to match the first.

‘Not yet.’

And that’s- too much to comprehend right now, when the ache from his shoulders is ramping up again and there’s an echo of his own misery in the shadow behind Novak’s practised smile, something a little too close to jealousy for Andy’s liking.

Instead of trying, too tired and aching to deal with the complications of tennis and rivalry and his best friend looking at him like he’s suddenly unrecognisable, Andy looks away and shifts, curling down into the cooling water to rest his forehead back on Novak’s shoulder, leaning into the curve of his arm that comes up automatically to steady him. Fitting back together like matched puzzle pieces, for the last time before Andy changes shape entirely.

‘I’d rather play like myself,’ he mumbles, raw.

There’s a long pause. Andy’s losing the fight not to drift back into sleep, every inch of him feeling weighed by exhaustion – so he might be imagining the light trace of fingertips down his arm, wrist, finding his hand to grip beneath the water. Might be dreaming the soft reassurance in Novak’s voice as he says,

‘You’ll do that too.’

 

*

 

When he wakes, he’s dry and warm and for the first time in months, nothing hurts.

Andy hums a relieved sound and stretches, blissful, feeling the weight of the duvet and smooth, thick cotton. Bed, he’s back in bed and it should bother him that he can’t quite remember replacing his wet boxers with the thin pyjama pants he seems to be wearing now, but he’s too comfortable to care.

He can’t remember the last time he woke refreshed instead of still exhausted, with only the residual ache of a good night’s sleep on a mediocre hotel mattress and he lets himself relax into the pillow without opening his eyes. The room is bright, he can feel the sunlight pooling over his bare shoulders and the bed, and he doesn’t want to stop enjoying how good he feels just yet.

‘Sleeping Beauty is awake,’ Novak says somewhere above him, laced in amusement and he laughs when Andy only turns his face into the pillow with a groan. ‘Too late, I have seen you. And you should be awake now, do you not want your surprise?’

‘No more surprises,’ Andy mumbles into his mouthful of mattress. ‘Sleeping.’

‘Does your mother know how you lie with that mouth?’ Novak teases. ‘This surprise you cannot avoid, here,’ and his fingers – it’s a briefly weird realisation, that Andy recognises the curl of his grip, the specific brush of his racquet calluses even with his eyes closed – twine around the hand Andy has tangled in the duvet, tugging it free and up, stretching awkwardly back over his shoulder.

Andy’s about to protest the angle when he touches the softness, his own fingertips brushing downy fluff.

He jerks upright with a gasp. Novak’s sitting next to him, fully dressed in jeans and a soft-looking blue hoodie, the familiar stretch of his grin wide and bright as the sunlight spilling through the open curtains as he watches Andy crane his neck to stare at his brand new wings.

‘Are they-’ Andy’s not sure how to finish that sentence. What he can see is fluffy grey down, all ugly ridges of bone beneath and an entirely unexpected wash of disappointment hits him. ‘They’re _tiny_.’

Novak’s sigh is heavy with exasperation, although his smile undercuts the sting.

‘I will send your doctor a memo,’ he says, ‘next time you need to know something to write it for you with small words and many drawings. Of course they are small, were you born six foot of Scottish paleness already? They need to grow!’

‘Oh.’ Andy stares over his own shoulder, watching his breath stir the thin puffs of grey fluff. It’s odd; he’s aware of them as part of himself, the way he knows where his arms are even with his eyes closed, but seeing them there folded against his back is still disconcerting, tripping him up with the unexpected new shape of himself. Hesitantly he rolls his shoulders and watches them flex, the fragile-looking stretch of them beneath the down. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes, yes, of course. See,’ and Novak reaches out, unhesitating, running his hand lightly across the downward bend of the wing nearest him; Andy has to grit his teeth against a surprised sound because it feels- pleasant, like fingers combing through his hair.

Except easier, because his hair had never been cooperative to being petted and was more than likely to knot around someone’s fingers if they tried.

‘This bone here,’ Novak says, ‘this is the humerus, and this beyond the elbow, look at the length? Is hard to tell how big they will be before feathers but these suggest big. Big enough perhaps.’ Idly, oblivious to Andy shivering at the ticklish-pleasant sensation every time he brushes the soft down, Novak measures his forearm against the wing. ‘The frame, already is almost as big as Rafa’s in shape, and the curve is similar. Maybe eagle wings after all.’

Andy groans. ‘Christ, I’ll need to spend all my training time on shoulder muscles.’

‘You will get those from flapping.’ Novak grins at him and tucks his spare hand under his armpit to mime flapping his bent elbow, laughing when Andy pulls a face at him. ‘It could be okay, perhaps you end up with chicken wings.’

Sometimes, Andy swears the universe deliberately plots against him. ‘Make one chicken noise and I will push you off the bed,’ he warns.

‘Of course I will not,’ Novak says, trying to look solemn over the amusement dancing beneath it. ‘Perhaps a nickname or two in the locker room however? What is the man with the bucket chicken – the Colonel?’

‘Don’t you dare-’

‘When you think, “Andy” is almost sounding like Nando’s-’

Andy lunges, missing by an inch when he gets tangled in the duvet and Novak tumbles sideways, trying to scramble away across the bed and laugh and speak at the same time. ‘No,’ he gasps, ‘wait, remember you tell me that time about Scottish names and why some are Mac, why you are not-’

Flinging himself forward, Andy manages to pin an ankle. ‘If you say what I think you’re going to say, I will-’

‘What, if I am to call you-’

‘-tell every journalist that you steal underwear from the WTA locker room-’

‘ _MacNugget_ ,’ Novak says and howls with laughter, barely pausing even when Andy tries to smother him with a pillow.

Only when Novak starts to wave his hands helplessly in mid-air does Andy relent and toss the pillow aside. Flat on his back, letting himself be pinned to the rumpled sheets by Andy’s hand on his chest, face pink and hair as mussed as it ever gets, Novak grins up at him.

‘Now I have good blackmail for rest of our careers, yes?’ he teases, breathless.

Andy sighs. ‘Why am I friends with you?’ he says. It’s not really a question so much as a despairing plea to the uncaring universe.

‘Er, because I do not let you drown in baths?’ Novak points out. ‘Because I am fun, much more than Rafa and I am your favourite, when you were growing wings you come to me.’

He looks pleased by the idea, of being first choice, the softness to his smile genuine and beautiful and the answering ache in Andy’s chest is nothing to do with growing new bones and feathers. He’s braced on his knees over Novak, straddling one of his thighs with his hand braced against the mattress, and the rapid rise-fall of Novak’s chest beneath the other, his heartbeat a steady flutter against Andy’s palm. Totally relaxed, trusting Andy.

He hadn’t hesitated over the bath.

‘Novak, I-’ Andy says and stops, worrying at his lower lip. A querying look flits over Novak’s face, the quirk of amusement he saves for Andy fumbling with the one language he has, despite countless attempts in the locker room to teach him to wrap his tongue around any of the handful of Novak’s.

‘What?’ he prompts when Andy only stares at him. ‘It cannot be worse than pretending you were not growing wings until you fall over?’

 _You’d be surprised,_ Andy wants to say. Wants share it on a grin and a joke instead of an awkward fumble but he’s not that smooth, ever, and the hot rush of affection behind his ribs when Novak’s eyes go wide, worried at the silence, makes him clumsy. He doesn’t know how to wrangle this, this _want,_ now that he might be able to have it after all.

Before he can second guess it, clinging to the thin confidence of Novak warm and easy underneath him, he leans down. Just has time to catch the startled flicker of Novak’s blink, the opal-shaded green of his eyes this close-

And then they’re kissing, Andy’s mouth on Novak’s, tentative against the warm, sweet part of his lips.

Andy’s not that practiced at kisses. There’s been a handful – that Italian boy who had the room two doors down from him in Barcelona who used kisses like currency; Kim, on those few fumbling dates after New York last year, before he cancelled one too many because his back hurt and she called it off; half-forgotten ones with Rafa, once, when someone spiked the punch at a party in juniors and Andy woke in Rafa’s bed the next morning, tangled in a mass of feathers and both of them (thankfully) still fully clothed, tremendously hungover and swearing never to drink again.

None of those prepared him for kissing Novak. Even Rafa, the hazy half-memories of tennis muscles and scruffy stubble – this is different because it’s _Novak_ , what he’s pictured a thousand times in the dark safety of empty hotel rooms and inside his own head, all the things he’s spent years pretending not to notice right there; the exact curve of Novak’s mouth on his, the quiet sound he makes, his hands-

\- his hands on Andy’s shoulders, pushing back hard.

‘No!’ he’s saying even as Andy gets with the programme and flinches backwards so fast, only his elbows catch him from landing on his new wings. Novak’s scrambling- scrambling _away,_ already off the bed and the sinking despair in Andy’s stomach is carved in granite, crushing him sick and breathless against the sheets.

‘Novak,’ he croaks. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t-’

Novak cuts him off with a wild look. He’s standing beside the bed, frozen except for his hands clenching restlessly at his sides. Gone sickly pale, all his laughter vanished as he stares at Andy.

‘What did you think I-’ he starts, voice thin and terribly, wrenchingly fractured as he swallows the question – it’s pretty obvious what Andy was thinking. ‘I don’t- we _can’t._ ’

‘Okay,’ Andy says quick, easing himself upright slowly half because he still feels on the verge of throwing up, and half to keep from startling Novak who looks an inch away from bolting. ‘I’m sorry, I’m an idiot for not asking, it’s fine if you don’t want-’ _Me,_ he almost says before it catches on his misery, how badly he’s fucked this right up. ‘-want that. I’m sorry. We can- can we forget it?’

Novak stares at him.

‘If I don’t want to,’ he repeats, weirdly hollow. He looks like he’s been shattered and put back together off-kilter, suddenly lost somewhere that used to be familiar. When Andy shifts as if to move towards him, he flinches back. ‘If I want- you mean, you do?’

Andy’s throat feels like someone’s taken a razorblade to it. He has to swallow hard before he can say, the least he owes Novak now – ‘Yeah. I mean, not if you don’t of course but I do. I have. For um, a while. Can we talk about-’

‘I have to go,’ Novak says on a single breath and bolts.

‘Novak!’ Andy shouts but, snatching up his tennis bag, Novak doesn’t so much as glance back. Before Andy’s even off the bed he’s out the door, heavy wood slammed back against the wall and Andy’s almost there before he realises he’s half-naked, doesn’t have a keycard to get back in the room and that Novak has every right to run away from him now, here where Andy’s ruined everything. For a second too long he hesitates and then he sprints to the door anyway, skidding into the hallway-

Just in time to see the lift doors slide closed. _Shit_. The only way he’d catch Novak now is if he could make it down four floors in seconds, if he could leap out of the window and-

\- fly.

For an instant, hope lights – and then dies with a whimper. Right, useless fluffy baby wings. Probably for the best, Andy thinks with the clutching panic of despair, Novak’s never appreciated being talked at when he’s upset.

And it was pretty fucking clear that he was upset, this time.

Turning back to catch the room door before it shuts, Andy trudges back inside for lack of a better option. Now he’s paying attention, he can see that Novak had already packed; all the tennis clutter’s gone, Andy’s clothes folded neatly on the ugly wingback chair in the corner and all the empty water bottles left in a neat cluster on the desk. Novak’s the only person Andy’s ever met who tidies up a hotel room before leaving.

Which means he isn’t coming back. Probably already headed to the airport and it’ll be days before they see each other, weeks; this thing will fester and solidify into a wall between them and Andy will have done what growing wings couldn’t, turned them into just another set of rivals who avoid each other in the locker room.

Slumping back down the bed, Andy curls forward with his elbows digging into his knees and feels his useless, down-soft wings curl forward too, mantling over his shoulders like a blanket, like a warm and encompassing reassurance he never knew he was missing.

Never needed before, because whenever he reached out Novak’s hand had always been there to catch him instead.

‘Fuck,’ Andy tells the empty room and covers his face with his hands. ‘You fucking _idiot_.’

 

It’s not until he’s waiting for the train home, tucked miserably into a corner of a Costa in Glasgow Central with his wings folded close beneath his hoodie and nursing a cooling cup of tea, that he sees the tennis results. The man at the next table is reading a copy of _The Scotsman,_ Greg’s face in pixelated technicolor in the photo catching Andy’s eye and he cranes to read the headline.

Regrets it a second later, _Great Britain Triumph Over Underpowered Serbia in Davis Cup,_ printed over the photo of the GB team celebrations and Andy has to close his eyes, gritting his teeth against a groan because it’s Sunday, the tie is over and Novak hadn’t so much as lifted a racquet. Because of Andy.

‘ _Fuck_ ,’ he whispers again – it’s the only halfway adequate comment on the mess he’s made of everything – and wishes bitterly that he’d never heard of wings.


End file.
